The Evening Standard’s Dispossessed Fund has secured £1 million for charities tackling gangs and helping young Londoners at risk of anti-social or criminal behaviour.

Minister for Civil Society Nick Hurd, who last month committed £2 million to groups supporting vulnerable young people after a dramatic meeting organised by the Standard with former gang members, has taken up the gauntlet thrown down by our Frontline London campaign and pledged to almost double the money to £3.8 million. His pledge includes £800,000 ring-fenced for the Dispossessed Fund which, together with £200,000 from the fund’s endowment, adds up to a £1 million bonanza for London’s charities.

The £1 million windfall will be distributed in grants of up to £50,000, spread over two years, with grantees announced in tranches over the coming year. Mr Hurd will also host a Business Round Table next week, to which he has invited captains of industry to discuss gang intervention issues in the wake of our Frontline London campaign, including how they can help ex-offenders make the transition into society through jobs.

Mr Hurd said: “I was inspired by my visit with the Standard to Kids Company. It was an uncomfortable but powerful experience for me.

“Once we got through their understandable anger, what I heard were stories of aspiration: the young man sitting next to me who’d been in 40 care homes and wanted to set up a catering firm, the boy who had been stabbed and wanted to be an architect.

“It was a room full of dreams and aspirations by people who felt shut out of society.

“I came away from that amazing group of young people thinking, ‘Can we do more?’ I will be honest, it was one of the toughest nights of my career because I was outside my comfort zone. But when we have kids killing each other on the streets of London we cannot afford to have politician-free zones.

“It is unconscionable that these young people should be exposed to such violence.

“I am pleased that we’ve created a £3 million fund for charities tackling these issues nationwide, including London, and that we’ve ring-fenced a further £800,000 for the Dispossessed Fund which you have made up to £1 million.

“Part of the attraction of working with the Dispossessed Fund is to set up a platform for other players, such as philanthropists, businesses and City Hall, to pitch in. Your campaign has struck a chord. I see this as just the beginning.”

Evgeny Lebedev, patron of the Dispossessed Fund and owner of the Evening Standard, said: “I applaud the Government for taking up this immensely important issue with renewed energy.

“It is exciting to see the Dispossessed and our Frontline London campaigns dovetailing to such powerful effect and we hope it can be a game changer for the brilliant but mainly unsung charities working in the sector.

“This further confirms the Standard as Britain’s leading campaigning newspaper, unrivalled in its commitment to tackle inequality and to forge social change in London.”

The new pledge takes the total raised by the award-winning Dispossessed Fund to £11.2 million — of which £6.1 million has already been given out in grants to 730 groups, helping an estimated 110,000 Londoners.

Our Frontline London campaign works with Kids Company to help former gang members exit the street by forming social enterprises.

Mr Hurd has accepted that “a new vision” is needed to tackle gangs and has further pledged to help find a long-term funding solution for Kids Company.